


Rose Marry

by cam94509



Category: RWBY
Genre: College debate, F/F, Fake Dating, Fake Marriage, i guess
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-02
Updated: 2017-08-03
Packaged: 2018-05-24 07:03:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 17,828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6145528
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cam94509/pseuds/cam94509
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Weiss has a problem: Her parents are, and always have been controlling, to say the least. She wants to keep going to college, but she really wants to follow her own dreams. The solution for her comes in the form of a most untraditional marriage proposal from Ruby. </p><p>Fake Marriage and sorta College Debate AU (Mostly focuses on the fake marriage, although it probably sticks to college debate more closely than most coffeeshop AUs stick to coffeeshops). Mostly focuses on White Rose, although there'll be some Bumblebee in the background.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A brief explanatory note for something in the story: “Running Start” is a program in Washington State (and maybe some others) that allows high school students to take community college classes in place of high school classes during the last two years of high school. If one is a good student and is careful with their classes, one can graduate at 18 with a high school diploma and an associate's degree. The implication is that Ruby did this.

From the other side of the debate team’s squad room, Weiss grimaced, glared, and generally made faces at her computer screen, “I guess I actually have to sign up for classes.” For a moment, I mistook her for being on the edge of tears.

“Isn't that good?” I asked, perking up slightly. I was really looking forward to taking more classes in my major. They were the fun stuff, unlike the boring general requirements I'd had to get out of the way while doing Running Start.

“No, Ruby. I have _no_ desire to do this major. I don't give a fuck about business.” She frowned.

“Then don't do it!” I responded, briefly feeling proud of myself.

“That's... not really an option.”

“Sure it is! Do what you love!”

“No, my parents want me to major in business, so I'll major in business!” She burst out.

“You don't have to do things just because _they_ want you too, Weiss. You have to think about _you_ , as well! Do you want to be trapped in a career you'll hate?”

“Ruby. You _do not_ understand. If you my parents find out I did _anything_ they wouldn't approve of, they'll make me go home. I do not want to go home again! If I go home, it's going to be _bad_ again.” Weiss was crying now, her hand momentarily going from brushing away a tear to brushing down the left side of her face, along the scar that reached from just above her eye to her chin.

I was briefly stunned. I'd only meant well, but I'd clearly made Weiss very sad.

Blake, luckily for me, cut in.

“That sounds... concerning.”

Weiss shrugged, “It's my life. I'm used to it.”

I frowned. That shouldn't be _anyone's_ life, and Weiss deserved better. Blake continued to press, which I didn't expect.

She sighed, “I understand that. Weiss, your family sounds a lot like mine. Are they... kind of like a cult?”

Weiss laughed, “Yeah, they run a company that's been in the family for like, 6000 years, and everyone who works there is related, and the dress code hasn't changed since it was founded. It's like preparing to inherit North Korea.”

At this point, I was totally out of my depth. I had no idea what to say, and so, focused on eating the cookies I'd brought into the squad room.

Blake laughed sympathetically, “Yeah, my parents, basically joined a weird political cult when I was five. They called themselves the 'White Fang'. They started out as an environmental activist group, but around when I got to college age, they turned... terroristy. Ultimately, when I got to school, I got a chance to get out.”

“I'm glad you got out, although that's not really an option for me. I really, really don't want the student debt. I doubt seriously my failing as a politician would ever pay back the loans.”

Blake smiled, “Not nearly as much debt as you'd think, although I've definitely got some. I got to declare financial independency, which means that I get a lot more student aid.”

“How does one go about doing that?” Weiss perked up visibly.

“Well, I got kicked out.” Weiss's face fell slightly, “I couldn't get their numbers for the fafsa’s expected income, which, along with some people agreeing that there was no way for me to get those numbers, meant I could declare financial independency.” Weiss's face fell more, “Ultimately, that meant that I could take a smaller amount of loans, live on my own, and not worry about my parents.”

Weiss was almost crying again, “Yeah, that's not a thing that'll work for me. My parents will just cut me off from their money, and they'll have lawyers to tell them not to hide their income numbers from me. Besides, they'll want me to come home anyway, so I'll be more under their control, rather than kick me out, and I'd probably be able to get to the financial information anyway.”

I had basically finished my box of cookies at this point, still really unsure how to help.

Blake nodded, “I mean, there are other ways, but those are pretty much out of the question.”

Weiss perked up one last time, “Other ways? Like?”

“Things like having a child or getting married.” Blake grimaced apologetically.

“Yeah, that's out of the question.” Weiss deflated.

“I'd marry you.” I almost whispered.

“Really?” Weiss asked.

“Sure.” I said, shoving my last cookie into my mouth. _Shit, did I just propose to my hot, mean debate partner?_

“I'll... think about that.” Weiss said thoughtfully.

* * *

It was midnight a week later when Weiss texted me.

_Ruby, when you said you'd marry me if I needed you to, did you actually mean it?_

I had to stop and think about it for a moment. I hadn't been lying when I'd offered, but suddenly this sounded much more serious, like she actually meant it.

It was a huge thing to have offered someone, especially someone I fought with frequently, and I fought with Weiss a LOT. I was also not quite sure it was legal. Also, I knew it might play out bad for me socially. Getting married at 18 was a big step, and I knew Yang wouldn't approve.

Still, it wasn't like I was going to get hurt like I would if we were getting married for real. I didn't love her, so when this ended, I would be fine. There would be no huge disputes over property, after all, we’d have the end planned from the start. This was to be a marriage of convenience, and it would be pretty good for that, especially since it'd conveniently “fall apart” after Weiss and I finished college.

It was a bigger deal to me that Weiss sounded like she was in a very tough spot. She was going to have to spend her life doing something she hated just because her parents wanted her to be something she wasn't. That wasn't something I was going to let happen. I would do anything to protect my friends, and that meant marrying them if I needed to.

 _Ruby?_ Another text came in, _It's OK if you're unwilling, that's an enormous thing to do for someone you barely know._

I had come to decision before she'd checked in.

_if it helps i'll do it_

Soon after, I got an answer in the form of a thumbs up Emoji, followed by a message, _We'll discuss this more tomorrow? In the squad room? 4:30? There's rarely anyone in around then._

I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding, _yeah sure_

* * *

 Weiss

* * *

I was in the room before Ruby. To be fair, I was there at 4:00, half an hour before I'd asked her to show up. This left me plenty of time to worry about whether or not the other women had changed her mind since last night’s exchange.

At 4:05, however, Ruby did show up, looking every bit as nervous as I felt. “Hi, Weiss.”

“Hello, Ruby.” I wanted to say something warmer, but this was such an awkward situation that I didn't know how to do it.

“So, how are we going to...”

“To be clear, you're _not_ asking me to marry you because you are in love with me or anything, right?”

“Right.” Ruby replied nervously.

“Good.” I breathed out, “Then what we do depends on what you're willing to do. I think it's probably for the best that it's not openly a sham marriage; I want a future in politics, and moreover, I'm concerned my parents would find some way to invalidate our marriage if they knew it was a sham; they have enormous legal and financial resources.”

At this point, Ruby took a piece of paper and began taking notes.

“Additionally, I'd kind of like to take your name. You're free to tell me no, I understand if that's something important to you, but it'd be a nice fuck you to my parents, and while I do plan on divorcing you when we're done with college and taking my old name back, I would like to twist the knife a bit, if that's OK with you, and I'd rather _not_ expand their family before I've gotten my chance to do something nice under that name.

I'm more than happy to pay for any rings involved; again, another chance to twist the knife a little bit. I'm thinking we should get married in a private ceremony; I'd rather avoid any kind of big public wedding, just because I'd rather have not have to fake that. I'm thinking our story will be that we've been in love for months and we're done hiding it?”

Ruby frowned, and jotted something down on the paper.

“Ruby, you don't have to flow this, you can just answer anything you disagree with.”

“Alright, from the top.” Ruby began, “I can deal with having to fake it for a while, that's what I was planning. I'm OK with you taking my name, although I'd like you to know that it was my mother's name and it means a lot more to me than just a fuck you, I'd just rather not wind up with your parents' last name. On the point about the ring, that's fine with me. So is the private ceremony. I'm not OK with that story, though, I'd-”

“No, Ruby, this is what's _practical_. It's what people are most likely to believe, and both of us have to put less work into pretending if our story is better.” I cut in.

“No, Weiss. Yang is already going to be upset with me about this, and unless you want me to tell her-”

“Absolutely not.”

“Then I'd prefer we tell the story that makes Yang LEAST mad at me.”

“And what story is that?”

“Here's the story. I asked you out a while ago. You said no.”

“This already sounds **super** believable.” I cut in sarcastically.

“Let me finish?”

“Fine.”

“you said no. I assume your parents are pretty homophobic, right?”

“Right.”

“Alright, you were like 'If I say yes to you, then we could get discovered. Then I'd have to return to my family's dwelling.'”

It was at roughly this point where I felt like I was being mocked. Ruby, however, either not noticing my irritation, or not caring, continued.

“A couple weeks later, you come back to me, having thought about it, and you say, 'Ruby, dearest, I have discovered a way that our love may be a reality. As a result, I have changed my mind, however, for our love to blossom, we must be wed, for only then can I get financial aid."

“I do not talk like that!” I snapped.

“Of course not, Weiss.” Ruby patted my shoulder condescendingly as she said it, “But what do you think of the story.”

“I mean, it's uncomfortably” Ruby laughed as I said that word, causing me to snap again, “Oh shut up! It's closer to the truth than I'd like, but I think we can hack it if we're convincing.”

“Alright.” Ruby nodded, “You don't want to tell Yang, but I'd rather not do this completely alone. Is there anyone else I can talk to about this?”

“Blake.” I responded instantly, “She'll know what's going on anyway; it's awfully suspicious that we had that discussion the other day and then a couple weeks later, ALAKAZAM, we’re married.

* * *

Ruby

* * *

The next day, we went to go buy rings. Weiss was paying, and she was talking about spending the rest of her monthly allowance from her parents on the rings.

“Weiss, there's no need for that. We can spend, like, $50 on each ring, you can save yourself a lot of money to spend on other things. Remember, this is a new relationship. We're just getting married for convenience.” I pointed out, as she looked at $500 rings, having to resist laughing as I recited our story for the first story, because of how close it was to reality.

“Sure, but it's still a _wedding ring._ Plus, I kinda want to tell my parents to fuck off, which is a goal of mine whether our marriage is something based on deep, permanent love, or just us trying a thing that we have to do to be able to have any chance.”

“Still, it makes both our lives a _lot_ harder if you spend all of our money on fancy rings.”

“I refuse to only spend fifty dollars on ring, Ruby. I want the message to be loud and clear; I want them to know that me buying rings was must than just a formality.” Weiss replied, still starting a somewhat gaudy ring.

“... a hundred dollars.”

“Say what?”

“A hundred dollars. It's a compromise, enough that it's obvious you're spending more than the base minimum, but not so much that it gets in the way of us actually starting a life.”

Weiss paused for a moment, clearly thinking the idea over.

“Actually.” She smiled, “That's quite elegant, and I think they'd be more steamed about the more careful, elegant diss.”

“See! I'm smarter than I look!”

“That's a stretch.”

“Hey!”

We looked at rings for a while, and after a few minutes, we found a beautiful ring with a sterling silver band and a ruby setting. It was a little more than the price we'd set, but on the other hand, it was a very pretty ring, and it made our story somewhat more convincing, in that it was sappy and cute.

We asked the jeweler if it was possible to get a matching pair of things like that one, and he (much to Weiss's surprise) said yes.

“Are you two getting married?” He asked.

“Yeah, we're, uh, getting married.” I stuttered out, a little unsure how to respond.

“Well, it's so sweet that kids as young as yourselves know what you want! You're a very cute couple!”

Weiss flushed, unsure how to respond.

Apparently, my super hot, mean debate partner was also capable of being cute.

“Uh... thank you?” I smiled awkwardly.

“Here, we should probably check how we should size the rings.”

After sizing our fingers, he told us he'd call us when he had the rings sized properly.

About a week later, he called us in, and we came in to actually get our rings.

They were beautiful, like something I would actually get if we were getting married. That hurt a lot; here I was getting married to my debate partner for convenience, during a time in my life when I should have been finding an actual partner, and I was getting this beautiful ring, itself an insult added to an injury I hadn't fully realized yet.

And I was going to have to give it back. The ring was gorgeous, and symbolically clever, something that symbolized each of us as people, and it was something that wasn't really mine. Not that keeping it would make it any better. As a symbol, it was sick joke, a reminder that I was giving up something valuable for a friend.

It was enough that I might have had second thoughts if I didn't know how much this would do for Weiss. Still, I was feeling a little less upbeat after we bought the rings and went to get cash out of a series of ATMs (due to transaction limits) until Weiss's bank account was empty. There was no going back now.

Later that evening, we met up in my dorm when my roommate was out to finish our planning. We decided we wanted a place off campus, because both of us had wanted to move out of the mediocre dorms, we wanted a place to plan, and it’d be easier to plan in that context. Some time during the extensive planning and figuring out budgets and where we were going to live next quarter off campus, I noticed Weiss was started to get stressed out, and I was starting to feel the stress a little myself.

I whipped out the box with the ring that Weiss was going to wear, dropped down to a knee, and, in my most serious voice, said, “Love of my life, winter frost on my lawn, our relationship of no time at all has meant the world to me. I would be honored if you would also share your future with me. Weiss Schnee, will you marry me?”

“Oh, go fuck yourself, Rose.” Weiss waved me off, but she laughed a little, too.

I smiled, “Right back at you, Rose.”

“We're not married yet, Ruby.” She replied, smiling slightly.

“Yet.”

Doing our financials actually came up with a pleasant surprise: Given that Weiss had this quarter paid for, and money for a deposit from her bank account, we would not have to take out loans after we got our financial aid if we both worked part time. This made the marriage a step up for me in terms of money as well; I'd had to take out student loans last quarter, and helping me and Yang had put a lot of stress on Dad, making him even more distant.

Once that was all done, we moved on to talking about what our “relationship” would involve.

“In public: Kissing?” She opened.

“I don't think we'll really need to.” I replied, then amended, “Except, obviously, for the kiss at the wedding.”

“That sounds about right to me..” She said.

“Hugging?”

“Sure, I don't see why not. Cutsey pet names?”

“Nah, too stereotypical. Shitty pickup lines?”

“Sure.” Weiss smiled, “Same bed, or different bed?”

“Different bed, we're a new couple, after all, although we may have to start sleeping together later on. Holding hands?”

“Sure. Date nights out?”

“Maybe once a month at a fast food place. We've got, like, 0 dollars between the two of us.” I laughed, “fake date nights in?”

“Weekly.” Weiss agreed, “I'm not really sure what to ask from here... we'll talk more as we go, right? If I need to ask you something, I'll text you, it'll give us more flexibility. We won't always be able to do that, but some part of the time, we'll do it.”

“That sounds smart.”

* * *

We filled out the application for a marriage license the next day. The wedding couldn't go forward for three days, which would be the Wednesday in the middle of finals week. We'd need two witness and someone to officiate. We decided on Blake as our officiant. This was for a couple reasons. First, Weiss’s name might draw unwanted attention to any public ceremony, and the two of us wanted to keep this out of the press for as long as possible. Second, Weiss wanted only friends involved in signing the legal document that would make us married, fearing her parents bribing third parties.

We spoke to Blake the next day and let her in on the plan. We offered to pay the fee she'd need to pay to get licensed to do so. She agreed, meaning we had our officiant. The two witnesses would be harder, because they wouldn't know the real story.

Weiss and I brainstormed for a while, and decided to invite Jaune, Pyrrha, and Yang. Jaune or Pyrrha were the fallbacks, in case Yang told us she wouldn't witness for us. All the same, I wanted to invite my sister to my wedding, even if it was fake. She’d be mad enough as it was.    

Jaune looked heartbroken during the conversation, and by the end, I was fairly sure he wasn't going to show up, which made our lives a little tougher.

Pyrrha seemed to think we were being a little foolish, but agreed to show up to support us.

Yang, though... Yang made me glad to have Weiss there to support me during that talk; I'd need someone who could be mean.

“You _WHAT?_ ” Yang snapped, “No. No, Ruby, you're not doing that. That's **_STUPID._ ** ”

Weiss took my hand, probably mostly as acting, but I enjoyed having someone comfort me.

Weiss, thankfully, stood up on our behalf, “Yang, It's not like we're actually promising each other forever.”

“No, Weiss, you are _actually_ promising each other forever. That's literally what it means to marry someone.”

Weiss’s grip on my hand tightened, her nails digging a little into the back of my hand, not enough that it actually hurt, but enough that I noticed.

“It's what it's supposed to be. Sometimes we don't have the luxury to do things the way they're supposed to be done. Ruby and I don't have the luxury of waiting until we're ready to promise forever, so we're promising each other until school is done, economically and romantically.”

“Yang, please.” I plead.

“Ruby, no. You know this is a terrible idea. Promising someone years at a time when you've just decided to be with them? When you've only known them for a quarter? That's...”

Weiss’s grip on my hand had loosened by this point back to a normal handhold, which I appreciated.

“Yeah, but I'm sure it'll be OK.” I replied, “I can handle this, and I trust Weiss. Plus, even if it goes south, it'll only be a couple years. It's not much worse than just having a long term relationship that goes bad, anyway.”

“No, you know what? You're right, you're a hopeless romantic, you're not going to be talked out of this. Plus, you're hardly the one who's fucking herself over here.” She pivoted her intense glare to Weiss, “Princess. Look. I love her dearly, but your girlfriend here is a fucking dumbass-” Weiss glared her (clever acting, I noted to myself), but Yang wasn't stopped in the slightest, “No, you _know_ it's true. It's why any decent person would love her, her and her self-sacrificing nonsense, and her helpless romanticism. Let's take a step back for a moment, because you're many things, but you're not an idiot.

Weiss, you're giving her intense power over you. If she wants to fuck you over, she can just walk away. You _don't_ have that kind of power over her. You're a very, very smart woman. You know this is a bad idea.”

Weiss seemed much less shaken by this than I was. I wasn't happy with the idea of having that kind of power, even over a fake relationship. After all, that was still power I was going to have. Weiss seemed unsurprised.

Weiss’s hand tightened around mine again..

“Do you think I didn't think of that?” The girl in white glared, “Yang, think about this from my perspective. Yes, Ruby will have a degree of power over me, and I don't particularly like that. But she's a hell of a lot better than my parents. Ruby is a kind woman with a heart of gold, like you pointed out. Someone is going to have power over me. Given that choice, Yang, who would you choose? Your sister, or my parents?”

“I...” Yang was stumped, “Still, it's a terrible way to start a relationship, and I'm worried about both of you. That's definitely not a recipe for a healthy relationship.”

“Yang, there's two things you should understand. One, this economically better for Ruby as well. She'll not wind up needing anyone's help, which means she won't need to take out loans, and it means that the people she cares about will have more money for themselves. And yes, Yang, I know you'd prefer your sister follow a more normative and independent relationship path. And yes, the benefit of taking out less loans doesn’t even the scales for either you, or your father. But for Ruby, it clearly makes a positive difference. She could walk off, but it's immensely to her benefit to stay with me for the time we agreed on. We're both in an uncomfortable position, but it's hardly the fucked up power nightmare you're painting it as.

Secondly, some degree of power dynamic is inevitable in any relationship that is also economic. All marriages, like it or not, have an economic aspect. It's extremely common for one partner to make significantly more money than the other. That one has more power, they can walk away far easier than the other one can. Even if we don't consider the economic considerations, there's plenty of cases in relationships where one partner cares more. Are all marriages, and a significant portion of all relationships, unhealthy?

Look, Yang. Unless I do this, I’m never going to have a shot at any relationship. Ever. Economic disparities aside, Ruby cares for me enough to do this with me. I don’t want to ruin her life, I just want to have a chance at us, and this is the only way I know how.”

“I think it's a different scale of power imbalance” Yang mumbled, she turned back to me “Look, Ruby. I'm not going to stop you, and I'll show up; there's a difference between disapproving of something and not showing up to your own sister’s wedding. But understand. I STRONGLY disapprove of this, and I'm a little disappointed in you. Please, reconsider.”

“Sorry, Yang.” I frowned uneasily. I wasn't going to fuck over Weiss; she was already too deep into this.

Weiss had gone from ‘angrily crushing my hand into a pulp’ to ‘softly reassuring’, which meant a lot to me.

“Alright.” She signed, throwing up her hands “Ruby, I'm mad at you, but if you ever need me, I'm here for you. Weiss? Look. I really, _really_ don't like you right now, but it's clear you're important to my sister. I'm here for you as well. You are apparently going to be family, after all.”

“Thanks, Yang.” Weiss said.

* * *

Weiss

* * *

The wedding happened that Wednesday, smack in the middle of finals week. We decided to have it in my dorm room, as my roommate had gone home as soon as she had finished.

Ruby wore the clothes she wore to tournaments, her moderately nice red and black dress combination. I looked her over; the girl I was ‘marrying’ was certainly a little naive, but at least she was good looking. I had also not dressed up all that nicely, just a little, because Ruby had told me not to spend any of my remaining money on buying a wedding dress. I’d thought it would be a good diss on my parents, but Ruby pointed out that they couldn’t even see how this money was spent. She’s also pointed out that I couldn’t live, exclusively to spite my parents.

Bad luck or not, we met up before the ceremony. It gave us a chance to talk over what the plan was; we were going to kiss and exchange a simple set of vows; nothing like traditional vows, but a simple promise to respect, love, and support.

Blake showed up earlier than anyone else, which was useful because we could let her in on what we’d decided; that we were going to kiss, and what vows we wanted.

She smiled, saying that she thought they were almost cute.

Fifteen minutes before the ceremony, Yang showed up. At that point, the talk of the conspiracy itself faded. Now, the show was on.

“Are you sure you want to do this, Ruby?” She said.

“Yes, Yang.” Ruby replied.

“You can always…”

“Yang, shut the fuck up.” Blake cut in.

“Why are you supporting them, Blake?”

Blake looked sheepish momentarily, then set her expression, “Because I think it’s important that the two of them get a chance at having a relationship, and that doesn’t happen unless this goes forward? Sure, I have my concerns, but I think they should have a chance at love, don’t you?”

“Whatever.”

“Hey, please, be nice?” Ruby cut in, “I don’t want anyone else fighting on my behalf.”

The room settled into a charged silence until Pyrrha showed up.

“Jaune’s not going to make it.” She let us know, “He said he ‘has something else to do’.”

“Thanks, Pyrrha.” Blake said, “Should we begin?”

“Yes.” Ruby piped up.

“Absolutely.” I smiled.

“Will you, Weiss, take this woman to be your wife? Will you respect her as long as you live, support her in all that you can, and love her as long as you may?” Blake asked me.

“I will.” I agreed. Blake turned to Ruby,

“Will you, Ruby Rose, take this woman to be your wife? Will you respect her as long you live, support her in all that you can, and love her as love her as long as you may?” Blake repeated.

Ruby, a better actor than me, bounced on the balls of her feet as she agreed, “I will.”

Blake began the next section of the marriage:

“Weiss, repeat after me:

I give you this ring,”

I began putting the ring on Ruby, “I give you this ring,”

I could see Ruby’s eyes clouding over; this was clearly making her very uncomfortable, although I had no idea why.

“As a symbol of our vows,”

“As a symbol of our vows,”

“And as a representation of our marriage.”

“And as a representation of our marriage.”

I slid the ring the rest of the way up her finger, and Blake turned to Ruby.

“Ruby Rose, repeat after me:

I give you this ring,”

“I give this ring,”

Ruby choked up a little as she said it.

“As a symbol of our vows,”

“As a symbol of our vows,”

“And as a representation of our marriage.”

“And as a representation of our marriage.”

We were now both wearing the rings, Ruby trying desperately hide some pain that I didn’t fully understand; we’d have to talk about that at some point.

“By the power vested in me by the State of Washington, I pronounce you wives!” Blake announced.

I leaned in, as did Ruby. I carefully avoided having our noses bump, and our lips met.

It was a fairly chaste kiss, although we held it until a mental count of four, long enough to be believable but not long enough to be uncomfortable. Ruby was an attractive woman, and a reasonably decent kisser, I discovered, so kissing her wasn’t unpleasant, even if it was extraordinarily awkward.

Ruby broke the kiss.

“Alright, folks, I need everyone to do some paperwork real quick saying you witnessed this.”

Yang glared as she filled out her section as a witness, Pyrrha merely completed it agreeably, either not judging or just keeping her judgement to herself. After the paperwork was filled out, Pyrrha congratulated us; Yang continued to glare. Blake offered us a ride to the local courthouse so we could drop off the paperwork.

  
We took her up on the offer, and like that, we were married, and I was free.


	2. Chapter 2

Ruby and I spent the next few days apartment hunting. We found a place we could afford to move into with our combined income (she worked at the on campus dining hall, I worked for the student government promoting events), and we decided to rent it. It was small, with what was basically a room that was both a kitchen and a living room, and then a small separate bedroom and bathroom.

Renting it was a tough hit to our financials; the combination of the deposit and the first month of rent bled dry most of the money we’d managed to scrounge together before the break. My job with the student government would be open over the four week span, but Ruby’s job  would not. Still, we had a slight cushion of money, and I knew how to budget, so it seemed pretty obvious to me that would be fine.

Moving in took most of a day. Ruby and I both had things to move, and neither of us had a vehicle. This meant we’d have to move stuff by bus, which required many bus trips across town. Luckily, the apartment we were renting already had furniture, which both saved us from absolute financial ruin (there was no way we could afford to buy furniture). It also meant that we only had to move clothes, my computer, Ruby’s laptop (which she carried in her backpack) and our personal possessions.

In practice, this entailed a couple trips to move Ruby’s stuff, and several more to move mine. On one of the many bus rides back and forth between my former dorm and the apartment, Ruby ribbed me about my extensive collection of silverware.

“What were you even planning to use these for?” She pointed to the box that carried, among other things, fifteen cups.

“Maybe I wanted to throw a party for me and my fourteen closest friends!” I blushed, defending that particular purchase. If I was being more honest, I’d talk about the way that my parents had controlled my finances such that not spending money effectively meant losing it to permanent savings they controlled that had I stayed with them, I wouldn’t have even needed. I didn’t, though, because that was pretty heavy shit to throw around.

“Weiss, do you even _have_ fourteen friends?” Ruby smirked, clearly not aware of how close she was to very dangerous territory.

“Ruby, I have like, a hundred friends on Facebook.” The moment the words left my mouth, I realized it was a fairly pitiful defense.

“And how many friends will you have after you update your last name on Facebook, though?” Ruby said, managing to move from ‘mildly risky jokes’ to ‘jokes that were hopelessly unfunny.’

“That’s not funny in the slightest. I glowered, daring her to continue.

Ruby, to her credit, recognized that she might have crossed a line. “Do you actually mean that, or-”

“I mean it.” I glared.

“Sorry.” She apologized quickly.

She certainly looked the part. I knew she hadn’t meant to hurt me, and I couldn’t help but soften a little. Still, I was baffled, “What could possibly have made you think it was a good idea to bring that up?”

“I dunno. I guess I can’t imagine being too sad about the loss of fake friends?”

I shrugged, “Ruby, you have so many real friends that losing fake friends doesn’t cost you anything. Meanwhile, I lose all my fake friends, and I just have no friends.”

“You’ve got me!” Ruby smiled.

“Great. My _wife_ is my only friend.” I frowned.

“Blake probably counts, too.”

“Maybe. Two _whole friends_!” I snarked.

“Sorry, Weiss.”

* * *

During one of the periods when Ruby and I were waiting at the apartment, I set up my computer, and checked my email.

I had a new message from my father.

_Dear Weiss,_

_I’ve just noticed a $700 withdrawal of cash from your account over the period of two hours. This happened roughly two weeks ago. Additionally, it seems that in the same timeframe, two very expensive pieces of jewelry were purchased using money from your account. I called the jeweler, to check if this was in fact you (I was assuming that these transactions were fraudulent), however, he informed that you and a female friend bought to ‘wedding rings’._

_I think it is obvious that you are NOT allowed to get married, and definitely not to a woman. You know that it would be_ **_very_ ** _damaging to the family name if you did, and, more importantly, it would be decidedly unbefitting of a Schnee such as yourself. As a result, you will return the ring, and we will have a serious discussion over this winter break about your behavior._

_With great concern,_

_Dr. Schnee_

I almost laughed; it had taken him weeks to catch onto something as obvious as me spending a thousand dollars in one day. I spent a little while thinking up my answer, before typing this reply:

_Dearest Father,_

_I would like to apologize that I will not be coming home to what I’m sure would have been an absolutely_ scintillating _discussion of my choices. My wife and I have a home to set up, and we will be quite busy over the break._

_I do recognize your opinion that I should not get married, and that you would consider it unbefitting of a Schnee to marry a woman. However, recognizing your opinion and agreeing with your opinion are entirely different things. I must admit, I do_ **_not_ ** _care. Moreover, it’s a little late to complain: Ruby is already my wife._

_Likewise, I will not be returning the rings. They are, after all, my wife and my wedding rings._

_With all due respect,_

_Weiss Rose._

_PS: You have about $5000 that you said you were “saving for me”. I would very much appreciate that money back, as I worked for, and am taking control of my finances at the money. Thanks!_

The postscript, admittedly, wasn’t even a vain hope; for it to be that, after all, there would have had to be a hope. For one thing, I had access to a greater amount of money I hadn’t been allowed to save in the form of an allowance, which he would likely point out; He’d done a fantastic job of simultaneously making it impossible for me to save money, and and yet always having me have money when I wanted it for things that wouldn’t let me tell him to fuck off. For another, I didn’t really have any _legal_ right to that money, and he certainly wasn’t going to support me out of good-will.

I wanted to feel like a total badass in that moment; I’d told that abusive asshole off. I wanted to. But I didn’t. Burning the bridge was relieving, yes, and it made me feel strong, but it hurt like hell. Every positive memory I’d ever made with my parents came whirring past, all the first days at school and the few warm hugs and the days where I’d come back with straight A’s early in my middle school career and get a small smile.

All of that rushed back to me, and then I was crying, a trickle of tears at first, but then a torrent. Then I was shaking, sobbing, having trouble breathing. Ugly crying, crying I didn’t like to do anywhere.

And then Ruby came over and sat on the floor next to me and I wanted more than anything else to stop crying, to not be vulnerable in front of that woman, but I couldn’t. I’d have to deal with her infernally cheery attitude.

“Weiss. What’s wrong?” She asked, soberer than I expected.

“Parents.” I answered.  I really didn’t want to have this conversation right now, not with my overly chipper friend.

Much to my surprise, I didn’t the response I expected.

“That… really sucks. Do you want to talk about it? We don’t have to if you don’t want to, I can, I dunno, hug you if that’s not weird, if you’d like, if it'd be comforting. Most of all, I just want you to know that I’m here for you.”

I had no idea how to answer that. She wasn’t the mildly annoying, chipper girl used to. She was… kind. She was being patient, even. Had she asked any differently, I would have told her to leave me alone, but here she was, being a person I’d never seen her be before, because I was distressed. Plus, she was one of the two people I could talk to and tell the whole truth about this to.

“It’s…” A sob broke free, “It’s really stupid. I don’t- I don’t even know what to say. It’s pointless. It’s stupid, I’m stupid. Don’t worry about me.”

“You’re not stupid. I’m sure it’s plenty important if you’re crying, but I can back off if you’d like.” Ruby said, hesitantly.

“No, it’s fine. I’m even down for that hug if you’d like.” I sighed. She sat up and awkwardly put her arms around me, despite the fact that I was sitting in a chair, and she was not, “It’s definitely stupid. I just cut off someone I know has been terrible to me, but every positive thing he ever did winds up being a reason I feel terrible about that. I feel like… I feel like what I did was wrong. Was what I did wrong? Ruby, what should I have done.”

Ruby didn’t respond for a moment. Then, cautiously, she spoke, “Weiss. I think you did the right thing. I mean, I know it’s hard, and I wish I could be more help, but I think what you did? That was the right thing. I’m not just saying that because in cases like this I’d always agree with your decision, because it’s your decision to make, it’s also that I think you did the right thing. Everything you’ve said about ‘home’ makes it sound unsafe, and there was no way you were going to get a chance to be a person you liked if you stayed with them, Weiss. Plus…” the word choice became more careful; Ruby, for once in her life, sounded like she was attempting tact, “Weiss, I don’t _know_ this, but it _sounds_ like someone at home hurt you. I don’t want to push on you on that, but if that’s the case, you really shouldn’t lose any sleep about cutting them off.”

“I… I’m not sure where you would get an idea like that, but…” I trailed off; I wasn’t really sure if I wanted to tell her all of this.

Ruby looked panicked, like she’d crossed some line, and I sighed, and then continued, “Ruby. Promise me you’ll keep this a secret. Promise.”

“Of course.” She whispered

“Before I start, can you tell me how you figured this out?”

“Weiss, you trace the scar on your face sometimes when you talk about home.”

I sighed, it was an obvious tell, now that I thought about it, although Ruby was hardly ever looking at my face, so I wasn’t quite sure how she’d caught it.

“It’s… it’s not like you think.” I insisted, “He only left a scar once.”

“Only left a _scar_ once?” Ruby raised an eyebrow.

“Well, yeah, I mean, he only beat me occasionally, after really bad days when I was kinda a little shit, so… I mean, that’s normal, right?”

“No, Weiss. Beating a child is unacceptable, especially if it leaves a scar, especially if it was out of anger at things beyond a child’s control, like, I dunno, bad days?”

“Ruby, I think you’re underestimating how much of a little shit I could be.”

“I’m gonna fucking kill him.” Ruby muttered.

“What?” I asked, confused.

“I said, ‘I’m gonna fucking kill him.’ Like, seriously. He made you blame yourself for him hurting you, for him leaving you a permanent scar across your face. I’m going to fucking… fly out to Seattle, and I’m going to fucking kill him.”

“Please don’t. I’m pretty much certain I couldn’t stay afloat out here alone.” I admitted, smiling weakly, “I kinda need you to not go to prison.”

“Fine.” Ruby rolled her eyes, much closer to the chipper girl I was used to (although, I was also much more okay with being with that girl right now), “But, I do want you to know: You absolutely did the right thing. What he did to you was terrible.”

“I’ll try to remember that.” I sighed.

* * *

Ruby

* * *

A couple hours after I had finished comforting Weiss, we sat down to have dinner, or at least, ramen, as I’d had some instant ramen back in my dorm and we didn’t have actual food yet.

“Tonight, we should probably get groceries.” I said.

Weiss nodded, “Yeah, I looked up a bus route to a local food co-op. It’s the…”

“Weiss. We can afford ‘a local co-op’. We should stick to, like, Grocery Outlet.”

“Nah, the local co-op is a way more ethical place to shop. I’m kinda surprised you’re not a huge fan of the idea, given how much of a bleeding heart you are.”

“Weiss, I’d _love_ to shop at a local co-op.” I said bitingly, “we don’t have that kind of money. We’re going to struggle through this break as it is, we can’t spend that kind of money.”

“I can’t believe you. Saving money at other’s expense?”

“We have to make hard choices sometimes.” I responded, as patiently as I could.

“Hard choices? Is that what you call that? Fucking over other people?”

“It’s either that or accumate credit card debt. If you wanted to have a whole shitton of luxuries and fancy-ass groceries, you would have had to take out loans.” I could feel myself starting to get angry at this point, but I tried my best to restrain myself.

“I refuse to sink into debt that I can’t pay. That’s a stupid thing that poor people do.”

“Oh, yeah, those stupid poor people.” And there I went, no longer able to try to pretend to be calm, “Did you, maybe catch on that _you_ are poor right now, Weiss?”

“Not _that_ kind of poor!” She exploded

“No, you don’t get it. You’re absolutely that kind of poor. I don’t know if you caught on, but over break, we are living on only your income. That means less than a thousand dollars a month, most of which will go to rent and utilities. You helped write this fucking budget! How could you possibly have missed ‘huh, that’s not a lot of food money’? Did you just not understand what it meant to not have money?” I exploded right back.

“I understood that I would have SOME say in the budget, you know, as one of the people living on it?”

“Yeah, lemme stop you right there. We don’t have a fucking choice. We’re going to buy food where ‘poor people’” I emphasized the air quotes, “You know, people like you, and people like me, buy food. You know what else? We’re gonna buy really cheap food! A lot of rice and beans for the next couple weeks, Weiss. We. don’t. Have. money.

And let me _tell_ you. The ‘stupid poor people’ bullshit? Yeah, that’s a no go, because, as someone who grew up poor, I’m just a little offended. Did you mean _me?_ ”

“No, Ruby”

“Ah, so you meant my sister? Or perhaps you meant my dad?”

“I…”

“Or, maybe Blake?” I spat.

“Don’t put words in my mouth! I specifically talked about taking out loans.”

“Ah, so like Blake, who is living _significantly_ on loans.”

“Oh fine, if you need me to be your fucking villain that bad, fine. I’m your villain. I don’t give a shit. It’s my budget too, we’ll talk about this later.” She stormed out, slamming the door to the bedroom behind her.

“Yeah, sure, later.” I muttered, grabbing my laptop out of my bag. There wasn’t much I could do right now anyway, so I opened up the laptop, plugged it in, turned it on, threw on a pair of headphones, and loaded up my copy of Borderlands 2.There was something deeply satisfying about first person shooters when I was angry, the chance to kill things, and I’d always had a weak spot for games with lots of possible weapons.

I played into the night; I was hurt, angry, and honestly starting to get hungry, and sick as fuck of ramen. I was also really not sure where I was going to sleep. I wasn’t going back in the room with Weiss, even if we were currently sleeping on separated twin beds. At around 10, my cellphone rang.

I paused my game and looked at the phone. It was Yang. I wanted nothing more than to open my phone and talk to her, but she didn’t really know what was going on, and it’d be hard to explain why I was fighting someone who I’d been “dating” for less than a month. I also wasn’t sure that she wasn’t still mad at me, and I could _not_ deal with my sister’s anger right now. I would just not pick up the phone and call her back another day; I would claim I was asleep, or spending time with Weiss, or any of another million possible explanations.

I let the call ring through. Within a minute, she was calling again. I could pick up, but she’d probably be mad that I let the call ring through the first time. I settled on an excuse in my mind: asleep, ringer off so I could sleep properly.

I threw my headphones back on, and went back to my game. I felt a little bad about ignoring my sister, but there’s was nothing to be done about; I couldn’t deal with her being mad, and I didn’t really have the energy to lie to her right now.

The game was not really fun anymore. It had been fun to kill things when I was angry, but now I wasn't. Now, I was sad, and lonely, and tired. I wanted to talk to my sister. I wanted to eat something proper. I wanted to not be fighting with the person who it most vital I got along with. I wanted to be anywhere but this shitty apartment with someone who apparently thought less of me and my family and the people I cared about because we were poor.

I closed the laptop, and I started to cry. This was the worst. I had known going into this what it was like to not have money; I’d grown up with it when my father had been going through the worst of his depression after my mother died and he hadn’t really been working enough to feed the family. This had been normal during the time when Yang had been mostly raising me.

I didn’t know to deal with the fights, though. I’d watched them, I’d seen Yang and my father fight over money but this wasn’t a thing I knew for myself. I had no practice at this. And the girl I was fighting with had no practice at this, but worse, she didn’t know what it was like to not have money. I had no idea how to teach her to deal with this.

And even if I did, she’d stepped on all my toes about being poor, talking about stupid poor people. I’d watched my family spend time in debt; they hadn’t had a choice. They’d done it to survive, to keep me alive. Did she think _that_ was stupid?

My phone started ringing again, and I just straight up muted it. Yang might have been right, but I couldn’t let her know that. As much of a jerk as Weiss was being, I wasn’t going to make her life impossible.

* * *

Weiss

* * *

I was woken at 7 AM sharp for my job; I was working three shifts a week, two of them six hours and this one seven hours. I needed to be there at nine. Usually, I’d have woken up at 7:30, but I was still fighting with Ruby, so I’d set my alarm such that I’d have an extra half hour in case we fought this morning.

I hadn’t slept terribly well, I’d been up until two and I was used to sleeping eight hours at least. I got up and got ready. When I exited the bedroom, I noted Ruby, thankfully asleep, across the chair in the living room like space. I wasn’t really sure what to do for breakfast. We didn’t really have any food in the apartment, but we still had a few more packets of ramen.

Frankly, I had had ramen twice in the last twenty-four hours, and I was not particularly keen on eating it again, but I was hungry, and pointedly aware that I probably wasn’t going to get a chance to eat until I got home, and even then, my next meal was uncertain. I’d done some math last night, and while there might be some things we could do, Ruby was at least mostly right about money; we simply couldn’t afford more expensive groceries.

On the other hand, I still wasn’t ready to give up my ethics in regards to food. Moreover, I was angry about how she’d treated me: She’d made me a villain, taken me out of context, and disregarded perfectly reasonable concerns about sustainability and the wages of others.

There was, however, no purpose to being angry now. Ruby was asleep, and I needed to eat something. I set about cooking the ramen. Luckily, it was easy, and the end product was… tolerable.

I wound up leaving a half hour early. I was ready to go, and I didn’t want to wait around until Ruby woke up. We’d have to resolve the fight later, I couldn’t afford to get drawn back into it and be late for work. We both needed me to keep my job.

* * *

The ramen carried me to lunch time, but by 1, I was simultaneously hungry, and legally required to take a lunch break. I also had nothing to eat, and no money that I knew I could spend. I spent my break walking around the student offices, not sure what to  do. I considered calling Ruby and asking her if we had money I could spend on a bag of chips and a soda, but I wasn’t really sure I wanted to give her the satisfaction of yielding to her on the budget, and I was pretty sure she was still livid with me.

Instead, I found some friends to nab small amounts of food from; a bite of a cookie here, a few chips there, a bite of someone’s interesting salad somewhere else. I told them I had forgotten to bring a lunch and didn’t have free money right now, most of the truth, and while I was embarrassed, everyone else seemed to understand. Ultimately, half an hour later, I was still very hungry, but I was pretty sure I wasn’t going to pass out in the next three hours.

* * *

When I got home, I was tired and hungry, and Ruby was on her computer. I almost snapped at her and asked if she’d done anything all day but 1) That wasn’t actually what I was mad about, and 2) She’d have been working if she could. Still, there was a fight we actually needed to have. I said the words I knew would start it, even while I dreaded it.

“Ruby, we should probably go buy groceries.”

“Yeah, we probably should!” She snapped back, “I wish you’d maybe thought of that last night, but I guess now is as good a time as any Weiss. You ready to go to buy groceries from a place we can actually afford?”

“We could probably afford the co-op, if we just bought cheap food. We would have the benefit of being sustainable, and -”

“Probably isn’t good enough, Weiss. It sounds like we’d be cutting it close, and even maybe going over isn’t a thing we can do.”

“Yeah, well, unsustainable isn’t good enough either.”

“Weiss, there’s nothing sustainable about going hungry!”

“Ruby, I refuse to fuck over everyone else just to save a few bucks for myself.”

“Weiss.” Ruby softened, gesturing for me to sit down. I did, although I felt somewhat condescended to, “You talk about things being ‘unsustainable.’ You’ve gotta understand, ‘unsustainable’ isn’t just food that’s been moved too far or produced in wasteful ways. ‘Unsustainable’ is spending money on more expensive food than you can afford. ‘Unsustainable’ is drowning in little fights so that you never fight the big, important ones.  ‘Unsustainable’ is risking the money you could use to go to college and make huge positive change because you’re worried about every little thing. ‘Unsustainable’ is forgetting that your well-being matters because you’re too worried about the world.

And that’s the key point. You’re not fucking over everyone else by choosing to live a life you can afford. You’re choosing to live. And that’s your right. That’s something that no one has the right tell you isn’t OK. Weiss, you don’t have to sacrifice yourself to the world like some noble martyr, you have to live.”

I had to stifle the urge to laugh; Ruby hardly had room to talk on taking care of the world at her own expense, given that she’d literally married me. Still, it was hard to be angry at someone saying you need to take care of yourself. But, I did have some fights to have with her.

“I… Alright, look, you’re right. But, I’m still a little mad. You made me into a villain in this fight, and you made me feel like I had no part in controlling my own money and you have to understand: that’s how they controlled me.”

Ruby nodded, “I’ll try to give you more of a say, although I’m not sure what I could have done here. I’ll also try to be more patient, but I need you to not talk shit about poor people, even poor people who you feel deserve it, because they mostly don’t, and you really don’t know yet what they’ve been through, and in a few months, you’ll be free to say whatever you want, but for now you really don’t know what you’re talking about.”

I frowned, that wasn’t quite the answer I wanted. I still felt condescended to, but I would take what I could get, “I’ll… try to hold my tongue about things that I consider errors made by poor people..”

Ruby seemed a little unimpressed, but then, neither of us got a perfect resolution.

“So, Grocery outlet?” Ruby asked.

“Yes.” I agreed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Why doesn’t Papa schnee have a name? Because he doesn’t have one in canon, and I feel weird giving him a name, and because to be honest the names I came up with for him were names that both me and my editor laughed at.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, sorry it's been so long, I've been super busy. 
> 
> I'm going to keep being super busy. It's a busy time. I have 3 300 level classes and two of them are part of the core of my major. It's a lot.
> 
> I am fairly proud of this chapter, though.

* * *

Ruby

* * *

I played with the phone in my hand for a moment. I wasn’t ready to make this call, but I knew that I still had to. I’d fucked up, I’d meant to call her back yesterday morning, but the fight had consumed me too much to even remember.

I dialed most of the number, but before I could finish it, I stopped. This was going to be bad, I knew that. I started over. I got through the whole number, and the phone rang enough times that I was almost sure that Yang wasn’t going to pick up,but on what must have been the last ring, I heard her voice. 

“Hi, Ruby.” She sounded more like a mask, and less like my sister.

“Hi, Yang. You, uh, you called the other day. I’m just calling back, I uh, I forgot to uh get back to you, I was asleep when you called, uh, yeah. I’m super sorry!”

“Yeah, alright, sure.” Her tone was chilly, “Are you coming to dinner at my dorm at some point? I called to ask you if you were interested in coming to dinner at some point.”

“Of course! I’d love to!” My voice sounded as fake as my smile felt; I wanted to be excited, but I could tell she was mad.

“Alright. I’ll see you tomorrow night?” 

“Sure!” I said, finding a little more fake excitement to draw from. I really was looking forward to seeing my sister, but I also knew she was mad, and I really wasn’t looking forward to that.

* * *

Weiss

* * *

“Hey, Ruby!” I said after getting back from a long day of work. She was gaming, and I did something that, a week earlier, I surely would have described as a mistake, asking, “How’s the game?”

“It’s great!” She enthused, hiding an expression of excitement (and her rest of the lower half of her face) behind balled up hands, “It’s cool! I collect weapons and get to kill things, and the weapons are super cool! There’s this one…”

And she went on, and on, and I felt a little like I should have been bored, but she was engaging, and Ruby made things interesting when she was interested in them. I couldn’t have cared much less about fictional weapons, but the interest she brought to them was borderline poetic, and her enthusiasm was contagious. 

I listened for about five minutes. I’d mostly tuned out the words at this point, both because I didn’t have adequate context to understand, them, and because they weren’t the really interesting part of what was going on; I listened mostly to her tone and watched the way she moved excitedly. After those few minutes, though, she startled, and then looked scared,

“Oh, shit, Weiss, I’m sorry. I must be boring you.” She apologized. 

I felt a little like I had inadvertently almost drowned a kitten, “No, it’s fine. Learning more about my housemate is worthy of my time, and you seem to care a  _ lot _ about this.”

“Yeah, but I can talk about other things. I could-” She looked a little panicked.

“Ruby, what’s wrong?” I interjected, “You seem upset and-.”

“It’s just… You probably think I’m weird, and I know  _ objectively  _ that the things I like are often a little unusual, and I don’t want you don’t want you to hate me, so seriously I can talk about something else!”

I sighed, “Look, I’m not going to hate you for liking something unusual, it’s not like anything about our lives are usual now anyway, and besides, this seems to matter a lot to you. We can talk about other things at other times, but a moment ago, you seemed to be enjoying yourself. I really don’t mind, so  _ please _ , continue.”

“Yeah, I don’t know it’s just… you know, it’s cool.” Ruby was now whispering, taking a breath like she was about to read a debate speech, and read it fast, “It’s super cool, I…”

And so she continued, for another ten minutes, and I found myself picking up a few terms here and there. For a brief moment, I considered buying the game just to understand what had her so interested, until I realized that first, I had no money, and second, and more importantly, I had never been interested in any game except when Ruby talked about them. Still, the girl’s enthusiasm was so contagious that I imagined that anyone would have to be somewhat enthralled.

After she was done explaining, she returned to her game, fidgeting with the ring on her finger whenever she had a free moment. I might have stopped staring, but she was hot, and pulling a ring along her finger, and it’s easy to see where my imagination went. After a few minutes, though, her thoughtless playing with the ring turned into something more thoughtful and intentional. More troubling, she looked progressively sadder, and I was reminded of the moment during the wedding, when she’d had a similar moment of sadness when we’d exchanged the rings.

“Ruby, what’s up?” I inquired.

“Not much.” She sounded evasive.

Unsatisfied, I pressed, “Ruby, you’re fidgeting with the ring.”

Ruby looked defensive, “I mean, I’m always fidgeting, I can stop but it wouldn’t-”

“One again, I’m not asking you to stop being you.” I frowned, “It’s… I know you move a lot, but you look more like you’re thinking about something right now, I guess I should probably back off if you want, but you seem sad whenever you interact with the ring, and, to be honest, I’m just concerned that something I’ve done has upset you. Still, I can back off!”

“It’s…” Ruby sighed, and took a moment to compose herself, “No, it’s fine. We can talk about it. But I need you to promise me something.”

“Which is?” 

“Promise me you won’t feel bad about the answer” she plead.

“I can’t make any promises about how I’ll feel. That’s not how feelings work.” I wasn’t going to make a promise I couldn’t keep.

“Fine. Promise me you won’t act on feeling bad?” 

That was possible, but… “I’m not going to make that promise. I don’t know what’s bothering you, and if I’ve hurt you in some way, I want to make it better. We have to live with each other for, like, a year and a half, and besides, you’ve done all the good in the world for me, and so like if you don’t like the ring or something we can come up with some story for why you’re not wearing it; I mean, ‘I lost it’ is a perfectly believable story coming from you, so-”

“It’s nothing like that, Weiss.” Ruby sighed, grimacing slightly, “Not at all, it’s not that you’ve done anything wrong of that I don’t like the ring or really anything that’s seriously bugging me, it’s just…”

She trailed off.

“If I promise I won’t freak out too much, would that be enough to get you to tell me what’s wrong? You’re not going to get more than that out of me.” I asked.

“Alright, I…” Ruby paused for a moment to think, “It’s not that I  _ don’t _ like it. It’s more that I really like it. It’s the kind of ring that I would wear if I were actually going to get married, and this is the time in my life where I should be meeting someone, falling in love. And here we are, wearing fake rings and missing that part of our lives.”

“We don’t have to keep doing this-”

“Weiss.” Ruby interjected, “You promised not to overreact.”

“I also said that if you were hurting I’d do something.” 

“That’s not really a choice for you anymore, Weiss. How would you live? Because you’re really cool. You’re my debate partner and my friend and I won’t let you suffer alone.” I could feel myself blushing slightly, smiling a little, “And moreover, I’d do this for anyone,” and suddenly I wasn’t smiling anymore, “But yeah. It’s just a little tough. I mean, I’m going to have to give this ring back and maybe I’ll meet someone afterwards, but...I am going to be a little sad, because this is the time I should be getting into relationships where I eventually wind up with rings like this.”

“I’m sorry.” I frowned, “I didn’t really think about the fact that you’d be giving up relationships for me.”

Somehow, the idea of Ruby in other relationships upset me slightly anyway. 

“It’s fine.” She shrugged, “I did think about it. It’s only a couple years, anyway. I’ll only be like 20 when this is over; it’s not like I’m losing my only chance at love or anything.”

I frowned, “Yeah.”

* * *

Ruby

* * *

“So, Weiss, I assume you don’t have anywhere to go for the days you have off around Christmas?” I asked.

“Obviously.” She snarked, hardly looking up from what she was reading.

“It’s not so obvious. You do have a sister and you could be staying with her.”

She shrugged, “Well, Winter and I will still be talking. Probably now more than ever before, but we’ve never really been on ‘spending three days over the Holidays together’ terms.”

“Alright, you should probably come home with me and Yang, then.”

“I can stay at the apartment, there’s really no need-”

I had to cut in, “Weiss, You’re my  _ wife. _ If you’ve got nowhere to be, it’d be super suspicious for you to just stay at the apartment. Plus, I imagine my dad would  _ really  _ like to meet you.

Weiss groaned, “That also means multiple days of acting like an actual couple.”

I laughed, “It’ll be fine, Weiss.”

“I guess. I’m just a little nervous. It could go badly; I mean, we’ll have to fool your  _ father.” _

I smiled, “You’ve already done the hardest part.”

“What do you mean?”

“Yang is WAY harder to fool than Dad. After all, Yang knows me better than he does.”

* * *

The evening before I went to Yang’s dorm for dinner was terrifying. I knew Yang was mad, I knew that I was going to get yelled at. I had built a thousand stories to tell Yang in my head, but they all fell apart the moment I imagined Yang asking me why it’d taken me a whole day to get back to her.

I wanted to be excited to see my sister again, but mostly I couldn’t stop dreading what was to come.

I caught a 6 o’clock bus, and got to Yang’s dorm at 6:10. She let me. 

“Hi, Ruby. How’s the other Mrs. Rose doing?” There was a hint of poison in the way she said ‘the other Mrs. Rose’, and I couldn’t help but stumble for a moment, 

“She’s fine.”

“Well, I’m glad to hear that!” She looked angrier than she had moments before, though.

I sighed, unsure how to respond. I’d been prepared to defend my decisions, but she was nowhere near as angry as I expected, which made life more difficult; I’d been prepared for a fight, not feeling like I’d betrayed her.

I walked in, and stood in front of the couch where we would sit to eat, not really sure if I should sit down or not. 

“Won’t you sit down?” Now she was being a jerk; this was unnecessarily formal and chilly. This was, in fact, the pattern throughout dinner; impeccably formal and polite, but never terribly nice or familial.

Mostly, though, I could tolerate her being distant. It hurt a lot, and I was nearly crying, but I also knew that she felt betrayed and ignored. It wasn’t until she picked up my plate after dinner that I got angry.

“What’s gotten into you?” I snapped. It was a small thing, but it was important to me: We’d done dishes together whenever we’d had a meal together since Mom died, Yang lifting me up and letting me mostly get in the way long before I’d been any actual help. This meant, practically, that for several years, every meal I’d eaten at home had ended with me washing the dishes with Yang.

“What’s gotten into me? What’s gotten into you? You get married, don’t even tell me you’re getting married until practically the week of, take a whole day to answer my calls, and then you just act like nothing has changed. I get it, you’re busy, you have a wife now, and I understand that means I’m not the most important thing in your life, but if you’re just going to act like I don’t matter, then don’t be surprised when I respond in kind!” There was the anger I had expected, gotten used to from my sister. 

“I know you’re my sister. I’m busy!” 

“I know that! I just said that. Still, a whole day? A whole DAY?”

“I had other stuff going on, I wasn’t sure-” 

“What could possibly be  _ so  _ important that- 

“I was scared, OK? I was scared because I knew you were going to be mad, and I didn’t want to tell you” I paused, realizing that I had talked myself into a corner, “Tell you about… about the stuff that was going on because I knew you were only going to get more mad and-”

“And I promise” Yang cut in, “your absolute WORST choice for not making me mad if you want to be a central part of my life is not talking to me!”

“I  _ had _ to deal with this! I had to fix what was wrong! I had to focus, I couldn’t deal with that, and deal with you being angry, at the same time!”

“What happened, Ruby?”

“It’s fine now. I fixed it. I deal with it like an adult, like you taught me to.”

Yang sighed, and muttered, “I can’t deal with this shit”, then stalked off to do dishes in the bathroom. 

I sat awkwardly at the little table, fairly sure I shouldn’t follow Yang, but completely unsure about what I _ should _ be doing. 

After a few minutes, a marginally calmer Yang shouted from the bathroom, “Seriously, what was wrong?”

“It’s not a big deal. I fixed it, it needed my attention, I’m an adult, I can handle my problems now.”

“Ruby, I can’t help if you won’t even talk to me!”

“I don’t always need our help with everything, Yang! I have this!” Honestly, I wasn’t sure if I was trying to convince her or myself.

“You clearly don’t! You couldn’t respond to a call from your own sister for an entire day!”

“It’s- It’s fine, Yang. I was busy. To be honest, it was more nervousness about how angry you’d be-”

“You know, I wasn’t even going to be all that mad, I was just checking in to see how you were doing!”

“Yeah, right, of course.” I snarked bitterly, “Which is why you’re so angry right now.”

“Let’s say that, from when she was like, two, to when she was like, twelve, you basically raised a young woman. Let’s say she just stopped fucking answering your calls. Wouldn’t  _ you _ be angry?” 

“I’d at least try to understand where she was coming from!” 

“Great! That’s great advice, Ruby! So, where are you coming from here? Oh, right, you won’t answer the damn question about what was wrong!”

“Yang, you’re still the biggest part of my life, but there are other people who matter to me now, and that means that sometimes, there are things that aren’t mine to tell.”

I could hear the sigh from the other room, and Yang didn’t say anything for a few moments. 

“Alright, Ruby. I love you, but right now, I  _ can not  _ deal with you. I’ll call you later, OK?”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean-”

“It’s…. Fine. I’m less mad now than I am hurt, and if it’s not yours to talk about, then it’s not yours to talk about. That said, I need space. I’ll call you later. Promise me you’ll pick up?”

“Yeah, alright.” I agreed, “I promise.”

“Good! I’ll talk to you later.”

“Alright, I love you.” I sighed as I left. 

“Yeah, yeah. I love you, too.”

I didn’t really start crying until I got stuck at the bus stop; It was another 20 minutes until the next bus and I just wanted to be  _ home  _ already. I was cold, the rain kept being whipped into the small glass bus stop shelter, and I had to deal with both the fact that I’d upset my sister and that I was going home to a girl who I wasn’t really sure would be kind.

I managed to stop crying before the bus arrived, which was a blessing: it meant I didn’t have to feel embarrassed about crying on the bus, and maybe I wouldn’t have to cry in front of Weiss. 

When I got home, however, that hope was quickly crushed.

“Ruby. What’s wrong? What happened?” I could hear a hint of panic in her voice.

“I… fought with Yang."

“Did she hurt you? What happened?” Ah. That was what she was worried about.

“No, she’d never.” I said, shaking my head, “It’s complicated.”

“I fail to see how anything that could leave you crying is all that complicated.

I couldn’t help but smile a little; that was very nice of her to say, even if she was wrong, “Weiss, if anyone is in the wrong here, it’s me, OK?”

“I… alright. Seriously, though, I will fight her if you want.” She said. 

“Thanks, but if you’re gonna fight anyone, fight me. I ignored her calls the other night, I didn’t call her back for an entire day.” I sighed.

“I don’t know how normal siblings would react, but that doesn’t seem like a big deal.” Weiss replied.

“Yang and I are close. Like, really really close. Like, she’s my best friend close, Weiss, even if I have a lot more friends than I used to. Given how distant dad was after mom died, there are a lot of ways where Yang took it upon herself to raise me. Me not answering her calls is like not answering a best friend’s calls, as well as a sister’s calls, as well as a mother’s calls.” I explained, “Besides, she gets a little clingy in some odd ways, and I knew that.”

“But you had your reasons, I’m sure. I can imagine you’d just-”

“Sure, I mean, you and me were fighting, and I didn’t want to talk to Yang during that.” I said, “I don’t think that means it’s OK for me to not respond, I mean, she’s  _ family _ .”

Weiss tensed substantially, and looked somewhat taken aback. It took me a moment, but I realized what I’d said, “Oh god, Weiss. That’s not what I meant! I don’t mean that everyone needs to… I’m just going to… I’m going to go to the other room and quit making things worse. I’m so sorry.”

I walked off to the bedroom, closing the door behind me. I went over to my bed, and fell onto it, crying again. 

“Why am I so stupid?” I mouthed. I couldn’t seem to do anything right; Yang was angry at me, Weiss should be angry with me, I couldn’t help but fight with her, everything was wrong forever. 

My phone rang after a few minutes of me crying. I took a deep breath, and then, after a couple rings, picked up the phone.

“Hi.” I tried my best to sound enthusiastic, but even I could tell I fell flat.

“Hi, Ruby.” Yang said. “Is everything alright over there? You sound really upset. Is this my fault?”

“Partly. Mostly I just… it’s a Weiss thing.”

“What did she do?” Yang was angry again, “If you need a divorce, I can help you work that out.”

“It’s not like that.” I sighed, “It’s my fault, and neither of us is getting a divorce, I don’t think either of us thinks this is a big enough deal to make her life that much harder.”

“She’ll be fine, she can beg for money from Daddy, I’m sure.” Yang muttered, “If you need out-”

“Yang, you KNOW that’s not fair!”

“Really? Because right now, all I know is that  _ you’re crying _ , your  _ wife _ ISN’T comforting you, it’s like she’s fucking abandoned you or something.”

“It’s not that she abandoned me, Yang. I just… I keep…” My voice fell, saddened, “Yang, I keep fucking up. I hurt you, I hurt Weiss, I feel like a terrible person.”

“You’re not a terrible person, Ruby.” Yang sighed into the phone, and then, after a moment, continued, “Look. I don’t trust Weiss. I think that’s understandable; she married my sister and she’s kind of a jerk, and everything Blake has said about her family makes me less inclined to trust her, even if Blake has decided that this whole stupid idea is just great.”

“I… You really don’t understand.” I responded. I couldn’t tell her all about how wrong she was, about how the way she had related to her family made me MORE inclined to trust her, because she’d had to survive them, too. 

“I don’t. I… know you can’t, but I really wish you’d let me in so I  _ could _ understand, Ruby.” She sounded defeated.

I felt pretty defeated, “I’m sorry, Yang. I…”

“It’s fine. It just sucks. I want to support you, but I can’t.”

“It’s… yeah.”

“Look, call me if there’s anything I can do, OK?” She said.

I was trying to hold back tears, make sure I didn’t start crying again, but I could feel myself choking up again, “Yeah, I will.” 

“Love you.” She said.

“Love you.”

She hung up, and I couldn’t hold back the flood of tears. I had fucked up. I had fucked up so bad, Weiss was probably furious, and I couldn’t go to Yang for help, and I felt so alone and isolated, and it had gotten to the point where it hurt to cry.

Weiss didn’t enter the room while I was awake, although I heard her lurking by the door. She was probably hurt, I reasoned, or maybe crying herself. I wasn’t really sure, but whatever she was doing, it probably wasn’t good, and it was probably my fault. Feeling terribly guilty, I cried for another good thirty minutes before I fell asleep, exhausted from fighting everyone I cared about.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm really, really sorry this is taking so long to write. I'm busy with coursework most of the time, and then when I'm not I'm just struggling to relax. Plus, more and more of my coursework requires writing more and more, and my debate work becomes more and more demanding as I get better and better at it (which is, of course, ALSO often writing), which means I feel less and less of an urge to write. Hopefully, I'll write more going forward, but I have to admit that this might well never get finished. I'll try, I promise! In future, I might well focus on smaller projects, so that I can know that I'll finish them. That just means learning how to write smaller projects, which I never really got the hang of.
> 
> I also am a little disappointed that I caught the short end of the stick in re: new canon, because Blake knows her parents and was not raised by folks who were still in the White Fang, but you can only do so much.

It took me a moment to realize something was off when I woke up. I was warm in my own bed, everything was as it should be. As I remembered the night before, though, I realized that I certainly didn’t remember getting in bed, or even tucking myself in. Still, I was here, tucked in, so it must have happened at some point.

I mostly forgot about my confusion when I realized that I had larger problems.

Weiss, for instance. She was probably super mad. I looked over to her bed, hoping she’d be asleep, but her bed was empty. I could feel my breathing coming a little faster than usual, glancing around wildly (and pointlessly, since she obviously wasn’t here). Luckily for me, even though she wasn’t here, something was: A cup of coffee and a note in front of my clock.

Hesitantly, I picked up the note. Her handwriting was small - beautiful, but it was clear that she’d tried to cram too much into too little space.

_Dear Ruby Rose,_

_~~I am not upset with you~~._ _~~That’s not right~~. ~~It’s not just that I’m not upset, it’s that you’ve done nothing to hurt me~~._ ~~_No: Ruby, I am far less hurt by\_~~

I smiled weakly. I was glad to know that she wasn’t super angry, and the way she started over and over again was kinda cute, but I couldn’t let myself be fully happy - It was a little bit painful knowing that I had, in fact hurt her.

_Let’s start this with you, actually. Last night, you cried yourself to sleep (which I assume you remember). I didn’t want to wake you, so I took off your boots and tucked you into bed. I hope that wasn’t too much; I definitely didn’t mean to do anything untoward, but you looked like you were going to be really uncomfortable tomorrow._

I was smiling completely now. How could I not be? I hadn’t fucked everything up, and that was a relief. Besides, Weiss had cared enough to make sure I hadn’t slept on the floor, had tucked me in, had made sure my boots were off.I realized, after a moment, that this was actually pretty significant: Weiss had been paying enough attention to me to figure out how I kept my blankets, and had recreated it.  

That evoked a strange feeling. It was nice, a warmth that bloomed from my chest and settled in my stomach. I tried to locate when I’d last felt something like it, but I couldn’t really think of anything concrete. I settled for understanding it as the feeling of being cared about - that wasn’t really specific enough, but it’d have to do.

_I really hope you are well this morning. You seemed to be in a lot of pain last night, and it seemed like whatever got said on the phone call only made things worse. I don’t know precisely what happened on the phone, only that I heard your phone ring, and that you were crying harder after the call than before it._

_As for what you said last night, I want you to know that while it hurt me slightly, it really wasn’t that big a deal._

I was broken from the nice feelings by the reminder had I had hurt her, badly. She didn’t even think it was a big deal that I’d hurt her!  Of course it was a big deal! The paragraph continued, _I knew you didn’t mean it, and you’ve been nothing but immensely supportive of me in regards to my family. If there is any emotional or personal situation that will impact you, I’d rather be able to help; as your roommate, trust that I’d prefer to help with it._

That helped to soften the blow a little, at least. I was glad she knew I didn’t mean it, and her support meant a lot to me, even if there wasn’t much she could do.

_Aside from that, I hope that today goes better than yesterday for you. I’ve made you coffee (it’s cold as I’m writing this - I meant to tell you all this in person, but I have to go to work). You should probably microwave it, unless you prefer your coffee cold._

_Best wishes,_

_Weiss_ ~~_Sc_ ~~ _Rose_

* * *

“Ruby, don’t you need to be packing?” Weiss asked. I checked the time, she was right.

“Yeah, probably.” I said, “Shouldn’t _you_ be packing?”

“No.” She said, “I packed two days ago, Ruby. Remember?”

“Of course you did.” I laughed.

“Yeah, well.” She said, blushing slightly, “At least I’m packed, Ruby. we’ve got like fifteen minutes.”

“Yeah, fine.” I said, and scrambled to the bedroom.

I packed in a hurry, throwing whatever I could into a couple bags. I didn’t fold anything, but I hadn’t folded it when it went into the drawers, either. Luckily, my laptop was already in my backpack (I had, at least, had the forethought to do that last night), so there wasn’t a whole lot to pack up.

Which was good, because Weiss and I only had five minutes by the time I got back to the living room. I sat down on the far end of the coach from her; I wasn’t going to get much personal space over the next few days, and while I’d have some excuses to get it some part of the time, every excuse I took would be another reason that Yang would have to doubt Weiss and I had a relationship.

“Are you prepared?” Weiss asked.

“Yeah.” I said, “You remember the plan?”

“Which part?” She must have smiled or something, but I missed it.

“Any part?” I said.

“That was a joke, Ruby.” She said. I blushed, frustrated at myself for missing the joke.

After a moment, “Seriously, though. Do we need to go over anything?”

“No, I’m ready.” She said, “Are you?”

“Yes.”

“Excellent.”

A few minutes later, there was a knock on the door to our apartment. I nodded at Weiss, and then got up, and got the door.

“Rubes!” My father said, wrapping me up in a hug before I could respond, “How are you? How are your classes going?”

“I’m good” I managed to say, despite being rather crushed by a hug, “I’m pretty sure I passed all my classes this quarter, so good I guess?”

“Good!” He said. He seemed to notice Weiss then, “You must be Weiss.”

‘“And you must be Mr. Rose”

“Mr. Xiao Long, actually. Rose was Ruby’s mother’s last name, but you can just call me Taiyang.”

“I’d just assumed you’d taken your wife’s name, given that Ruby had it. Sorry.”

He shrugged, “It’s fine. It’s not like her name is an unwelcome thing.”

Weiss shifted uneasily. I had a decent idea of why; after all, it wasn’t just my name anymore. It was her name, too.

“Anyway, let me help you get your stuff.” He said, clearly able to tell that something was off. I handed him one of my bags, and picked up both the clothes bag and the backpack I’d put my laptop in. Weiss got her suitcase, and we all went out to my father’s car.

I got into the backseat of the car while Weiss put her bag in the trunk. My sister was already there. Some part of me expected this to turn into an intervention: While Weiss and I could handle Yang’s disapproval, I was unsure if we could handle a conversation where there were as many people I cared about who were disapproving as there were of us.

Weiss joined me in the back seat: There was a seat between us, which meant we would have some excuse to not have to pretend to be just the right amount of all over each other.I felt a wave of nervous energy if as my father started the car - if this turned into a lecture, I’d be stuck in here for a couple hours of it.

To my surprise, the lecture never began. Instead, the car was silent except the sound of the engine. Yang seemed to be sulking slightly, and Weiss seemed smaller than usual, sunk slightly into her seat, holding her handbag close to her chest.

I took out my cellphone and texted her _u alright?_

Her phone buzzed in her bag, and she got it out. She sighed audibly as she read the message, and then tapped out a response.

_Honestly? I don’t know. I’m really, really worried. I’m half scared we’re going to get lectured about being irresponsible, and the other half of me is scared that even if that doesn’t happen we’re going to fuck this up._

I smiled weakly at the phone, and responded, _Im a litle worried about the first half, Yang is sulking tho so my initial take is that htere isn’t going to be a big fight there. On the second half stuff my take is you’ll do excellent, u r very smart and can do anything you set your mind to!_

Weiss laughed. _God, Ruby, you are the most infuriatingly optimistic ray of sunshine._

I smiled, _Correct!_

The rest of the text conversation went like this:

_W: That’s not really something to be proud of, Rubes._

_R: u r allowed to call me “Rubes” out loud in front of my family and no other time, Weissy._

_W: You’ve got a deal as long as you NEVER call me Weissy again_

_R: Deal._

* * *

**Weiss**

* * *

When I got to Ruby’s father’s house - my father in law’s house now, I realized - everything was a flurry of activity. We unloaded our things; Ruby had a couple bags that I knew she had thrown together in a few moments, and I had my suitcase.

Ruby’s father led to us to a room at the end of the hallway. When we went in, I knew instantly that it was Ruby’s childhood room: The shade of the room was slightly redder than a 1970 Chinese propaganda poster. I’d known red was her favorite color, but I hadn’t caught on to the extent.

I placed my suitcase by the bed that we would be sharing. Seeing the bed, I had momentary second thoughts - it was significantly smaller than I’d imagined, and I was at least a little bit worried that it would make things awkward. Ruby tossed her bags on the floor as if she wasn’t concerned in the slightest about their contents or where they wound up.

Which was probably true. I could imagine her response if I pointed it out, something along the lines of _it’s just clothes, Weiss._ Which was true. It was just clothes, so I didn’t actually say anything.

I looked more carefully around the room. Not only were the walls covered in red posters, but Ruby had an entire bookshelf full of comic books about superheroes. I walked over to them, and picked one out at random.

“Is this one any good?” I asked.

“No, it’s terrible.” she laughed.

“Then why do you have it?”

“It’s a collection. You don’t just collect things that are good, you collect all kinds of things when you collect them.”

“I’m not even sure that’s quite how a collection works, Ruby Rose.”

“Well, it’s how my collections work, Weiss Rose.” She smirked as she said it.

* * *

Dinner was somewhat confusing. The Rose-Xiao-Long family ate together, which I gathered from Ruby’s stories had not always been the case. For me, however, the whole family eating together was more confusing - Mom and Dad could hardly ever be found in the same room nowadays, certainly not in somewhere they might be seen.

Watching Ruby and her father converse idly, even with the obvious elephant in the room (me) I found myself confused. Wasn’t Ruby scared of her father, at least a little bit? And yet, even though she had done something bigger than I’d ever done - well, as big as I’d ever done, and I hadn’t stuck around afterwards - she didn’t seem to be even a little scared that she was going to be yelled at or hit.

Ruby had definitely been horrified when she learned I’d been struck as a child, but I’d assumed that it was partly just because Ruby had surely been a better child than me, and that her horror had been built off a kind of naivety. I’d reasoned that she was certainly a better person than me. In retrospect, I realized I was obviously incorrect - she might be a better person than me, but that didn’t mean that she had been a better child than me.

In fact, it was pretty obvious that she wouldn’t have been: Ruby’s constant movement would have infuriated a parent like my father, and she would have a significantly rougher time of it had she been in my shoes.

I hadn’t really felt jealous of Ruby before, or really anyone. My childhood had been phenomenally privileged in many respects. I’d had more money than any child could ever need, better tutors than anyone could imagine, and I probably could have gone to any school I wanted.  (I chose the school I did only because it gave me as much space as possible, and it had a surprisingly solid business program).

Now, however, I couldn’t help but feel intensely jealous. I fought against it - Ruby had a rough childhood, too, from her mother’s death to her father’s significant withdrawal during her childhood, and money had often been extremely tight for she and her sister when they were growing up, but at least she’d never had to fear being struck/

I was snapped back to the moment by Ruby resting a hand on mine,

“Is everything alright?” she said, quietly.

I shook my head slightly, hoping to avoid a conversation here, but everybody at the table was already looking at me with concern, including Yang, who seemed to have been angry at me ever since our conversation about me marrying Ruby.

“I’m sorry.” I said, laughing a little, “It’s just… this is a weird contrast from home.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Yang asked, glaring again.

Of course, Yang and Mr. Xiao-Long not knowing about my home life was one of the reason I’d wanted to avoid this conversation altogether. I sighed, and I could see offense creeping into Ruby’s face, as if Yang had crossed a line.

“She doesn’t know.” I quietly reminded Ruby.

“Doesn’t know what?” Yang said.

“Home…” I began, and then paused for several seconds, trying to figure out how to say as little as possible while still saying enough, “Home wasn’t always physically safe as a kid.”

Yang looked confused, so I elaborated, “I… guess I’m realizing that what I faced at home was physical abuse. It’s weird watching a relatively normal family.”

Yang softened, at least temporarily mollified. Ruby’s father softened significantly, too, but he’d seemed mostly confused and less angry before. Ruby beamed at me, a face I recognized as her being proud, although I wasn’t fully sure why.

“I’d prefer that never leaves the room, if that’s OK.” I continued hastily, “If it become public knowledge that I said my father beat me, I’d be fighting him in the press. I just made a decision the public would see as a Very Bad Decision, and he has billions of dollars and I’ve got a few hundred dollars at most, so I’d rather dodge that fight.”

“Of course.” Ruby’s father said, “Just let me know if there’s any help you need that I can give you. Ruby clearly cares about you a lot, and if you’re important to my daughter, you’re important to me.”

“Thanks.” I said, weakly.

Yang frowned, “I’ll also do anything to protect my sister, and I guess that extends to supporting you here. If you need me to break his legs-”

She smiled, assured that I understood the promise. I laughed, “Thanks, but Ruby probably needs you not in jail, so you probably shouldn’t break his legs. Besides, you’d have to explain why, and that’d put us back in the world where I have to fight him in the press, and I’ve already explained why I don’t want that.”

She laughed, “Fair point.”

* * *

**Ruby**

* * *

After dinner, we went to my room. I shut the door after us.

“You OK?” I asked.

Weiss shrugged, “I’m going to need a definition for ‘Ok’’”

“I dunno, let’s go with ‘not hurt?’”

“I mean, I’m not _physically injured_.”

“Fine, it was a shit definition. ‘Not in emotional, physical, or psychological distress’.”

Weiss sat down on the bed, “Definitely not then. I feel jealous, and I know, that’s not fair, you had a rough childhood, too, but… I don’t know. Your sister is angry at you and your father is obviously concerned, but you’ve been safe here, even despite that. I also feel super vulnerable; I trust your father not to hurt me, and I trust Yang not to hurt you, and thus not to hurt me, but I don’t really know them well enough to feel comfortable putting my future in their hands.

And honestly, I’m so emotionally worn out. Fighting you is rough, feeling hungry is rough, eating the same two things every day is rough, having to cook everything I eat is rough, having lost my parents is rough, realizing that my childhood didn’t have to be like it was is rough, and it just never stops. It’s just one blow after another. I’m so exhausted.”

I nodded, and sat next to her, facing at a right angle to her. “I get that. I’m pretty worn-out, too. I’m hoping it’ll be easier during the quarter, since I’ll have more money, and we’ll both have things to do, but if it’s not, please, talk to me.

And… is there anything I can do to help with you feeling vulnerable?”

“Not really, no.” She said, but I could hear a smile in her voice.

* * *

One of the things we’d avoided so far was having to change in the same room. It wasn’t even a thing I’d thought about being possibly awkward - when we were at home, we’d never had to fool anyone, so we’d never had to change in front of each other.

That changed today. Weiss and I obviously couldn’t avoid being in the same room together when we changed; that would be a pretty obvious giveaway. Thus, Weiss was changing behind me, and I staring so pointedly at a particular spot on the floor that I was vaguely surprised when it didn’t catch fire.

The awkwardness of the situation brought a thought came uninvited to my mind. _I wonder what she looks like naked._ This, of course, meant that I got to have fun times fighting my own brain about stupid thoughts.

 _She’s not even h- well, she’s not that hot._ I tried to convince myself.

But wasn’t she? She was cute, that wasn’t a matter of question. It wasn’t really a reflection on myself that I realized that; she dressed in ways that accentuated her better features, she was muscular - but then, the second part _was_ about me: _I_ was into girls who were strong enough to bench press me, that wasn’t an everybody thing.

Did I find her attractive?

That was an uncomfortable thought. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that I _was_ attracted to her. It wasn’t even the first time I’d acknowledged that she was hot, although now it seemed more pressing, more certain and relevant.

That was an uncomfortable place to be. It could change a lot, after all - I worried that I would treat her differently somehow. She needed me supportive, as someone she could lean on, and if this changed how I behaved, it could actively get in the way of that.

“Ruby?”

“Oh, yeah, sorry, just thinking.”

“I’m done changing.”

Good. “Weiss, I’m going to go make myself a snack. Would you like something?”

“ _Would you like something_ and not _you want something_? Wow, careful. Soon you’ll be saying things like ‘for our love to blossom, we must be wed’”

I shrugged, “Probably.”

“Are you OK?”

“There’s just a lot going on in my head.” I admitted, “I need some space to get my head in order, if that’s OK. Do you want anything to eat?”

Weiss shrugged, “Not really. We did just eat.”

“Guess that was a dead giveaway, too."

“Exactly.” I could hear that she was smiling.

I walked out of my room and over to the living room; if Weiss already knew that this was about me clearing my head, it wasn’t like I had to pretend I was doing it to make food, and the rocking chair here was more familiar.

Being attracted to Weiss was bad, and I could feel my breath coming ever so slightly too fast. I had to remind myself that this wasn’t the end of the world, that there were definitely ways I could handle this.

Really, there were two ways.

I could tell her. On one hand, this seemed like it would normally be the Right Thing tell someone how I felt about them. Yang had always told me that telling someone how you feel about them was always the right thing to do - even if they said no, it was better to be told no than to let feelings build up. I was pretty sure Yang didn’t follow her own advice there, but I wasn’t entirely sure Yang had followed her own advice at any point in her life. I hadn’t really taken it, either, but it seemed more pressing in a world where developing a unrequited crush would be disastrous.

On the other hand, this situation was definitely unusual. For one thing, I didn’t really know if I was even romantically attracted to her - in fact, nothing I knew seemed to hint that this was the case. All I knew was that I thought she was hot. Even that might have been worth talking to her about, except that it was 1) Desperately unlikely to solve the problem, since friends-with-benefits types scenarios were generally unstable, 2) creepy as fuck, given that we both relied on each other to survive, 3) not going to produce something I wanted, anyway. Casual sex might be someone else’s thing, but it wasn’t mine. The conversation, then, didn’t avoid the potential problems it was supposed to prevent.

The other option, here, was to keep it to myself. That seemed like a good idea: It seemed like there wasn’t an ethical way to talk about Weiss about this, given that she was reliant on me to survive, there wasn’t a good outcome, and besides: I knew how to control myself. I wasn’t going to fall in love with her. She was just hot. I could deal with that. I’d already known it! If things got worse, I could reconsider, but they _wouldn’t_ get worse, of course.

I smiled to myself, the problem resolved, and heard as the stairs creaked.

“Weiss?” I asked.

My father laughed slightly, “Sorry, it’s just me, kiddo.”

“Ah. Hi, Dad.”

“You OK, little Rose?”

“I guess. I’ve definitely figured out what I’m going to do.”

“Good!” He seemed genuinely happy, but then “Can we talk?”

I was dreading this, “Yeah, I guess.”

“You know you can talk to me about whatever, right? I won’t always think you’re making the right choices, and sometimes I’ll tell you that, but you’ll always have my support.” He said.

“I know.”

“Then why _didn’t_ you talk to me before getting married? I’m not going to judge you about getting married, or try to convince you you shouldn’t have, what’s done is done. But I’m confused and I’d like to know what’s going on.”

I deflated. He was right, and not only was he right, but so far this had been a disaster. Weiss and I fought, and just when we’d stopped fighting, I’d discovered that my feelings about her were more complicated.

“I guess I didn’t want to fight someone else about it. I’d already fought Yang, and…”

He smiled, “I guess that’s not all that surprising. I know I haven’t always been the best of fathers, and I guess it makes sense you’d talk to Yang and not me.”

“I kinda wish I’d talked to you, in retrospect. Yang is a lot… angrier.”

‘Yes. She’s not used to the idea that you’ll grow up in ways she couldn’t expect yet. She will, eventually, come to understand that. You could both do with being patient with one another.”

I sighed, “Yeah. I’m sorry I didn’t talk to you, for what it’s worth.”

“I take it you’re not sure you made the right decision?”

I paused for a moment. Had I made the right decision? This had all been a disaster, but Weiss was free. Really, honestly free. Free from an abusive, controlling family that was going to use every bit of control they had to win more control and shape her entire life. Surely that was worth a little bit of a struggle, right?

“No. I’m sure I made the right _decision_. I’m not sure I thought through the whole process, though, and maybe if I’d thought it through more carefully, things would be perfect instead of just good.” I wasn’t sure he’d have been able to actually help, since I wouldn’t have told him the whole truth, but he might have, and ultimately, in trying to avoid hurting him, I’d only hurt him worse.

‘Good’ was a lie, but I had to avoid giving away too much, and besides, I didn’t want him to worry too much. I’d already worried him enough.

“You don’t need to lie to me. I can tell it’s not good right now. Weiss could, and she’s the one in this house who knows you the least well. That doesn’t mean it’s never going to be good, although it’s not a great sign. You’ve taken on a lot, though. Figuring out how to live with someone and date them at the same time is a lot, and normally those aren’t steps that are taken together, which means you don’t have an awful lot of support.”

I laughed, “Weiss did, in fact, figure out that something was wrong. How’d you figure it out?”

He pointed to the rocking chair I was sitting in, “That’s how.”

“I am just all giveaways, all the time.” I smiled sadly.

He laughed, “You know, kiddo. You don’t have to worry about giving yourself away if you don’t lie as much.”

I laughed, “I’ve been getting that.”

“Then go tell Weiss what’s wrong. Talk to her.” He said.

“Of course.” I said. Lied, actually - I’d made my own decision here: with everything going on, I was absolutely not free to tell Weiss the whole story: She was unable to consent in this case, so I had to keep this to myself. I realized, with some degree of resignation, that I was now keeping a secret from everyone, despite a desire to be keeping no secrets from anyone, instead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That downer ending, though. 
> 
> I promise, I'm working on C5 starting today!
> 
> I hope I finish it.

**Author's Note:**

> Somehow, this story is ever so slightly inspired by what was almost a true story? Also, the line about cutesy petnames and that being “too stereotypical” was a tip of my hat to the Les Mis exR fake dating icon World Ain’t Ready.


End file.
